On horseback through Nigeria; or, Life and travel in the central Sudan

Preface

Northern Nigeria is the most recent acquisition of the British Empire. Its area is approximately 250,000 square miles, and its population, at a moderate estimate, 8,000,000 inhabitants. Its mediaeval civilisation and its medley of tribes and races were first described by Barth some sixty years ago, and up to the closing years of the nineteenth century there were few or no changes in the internal condition of the country. The pagans of the forests and the hills continued to be ruthlessly raided by the Mohammedan slavers of the north, while the Fulani administration of the ancient Hausa States became more and more corrupt. The British occupation in 1900 was dictated first by motives of humanity and later by considerations of policy, and, curiously enough, the greatest resistance to the extension of the Protectorate has been oiTered by the pagans themselves, whom experience has taught to look upon all strangers as hereditary foes* The main purpose of this book is to exhibit,

Preface

through the medium of a narrative of travel, the present condition of the country under British rule and the remarkable prestige which the white man has secured within a few short years amongst pagans and Mohammedans alike.

The tour of the Protectorate was not wholly accomplished by me in a single journey, as described in the text. Some portions of the country were visited at an earlier date in the course of my wanderings as the principal officer of the Mineral Survey. The journey as described, however, is by no means an impossible one for an experienced traveller, able to obtain fresh horses and carriers as required throughout the course of his travels.

I am indebted to the executors of the late Mr.

Arthur Longbottom for the photographs from

which have been prepared the illustrations facing

J. D. F.

August, 191 1,

Chapter I Page

On the Niger . . . . . • iS

Arrival at Forcados — the Empire and her skipper — Cooks and steward boys — The creeks of the delta — Trading stations on the river — Rectangular wattled huts — The head of the delta — Native convicts at Onitsha — Aground on a sandbank — The harmattan haze — ^^Allahu akbar" — The frontier of Northern Nigeria — Picturesque scenery — Bush fires on the river bank — A stranded steamer — In sight of Lokoja.

chapter ii Lokoja to Keffi . . . . .35

Lokoja and Mount Patti — Carriers and traders — A public lecture in the courthouse — Departure from Lokoja — The R.M.S. {S)Tork — Careless navigators — The port of Loko — Disembarkation — A fruitless search for horses — On foot to Nassarawa — Wandering traders — A deserted town — The fatigues of travel — A broad English road — Rebuilding the Residency — Nassarawa and its warrior king — Picturesque country — Professional beggars and native magicians — The discontented mallams of Keffi.

Contents

Chapter III Page

A bush camp — A trader's zungo — A deserter — Christmas Eve — Market day at Jaginde — The margin of the plateau — The Sho-sho people — Rectangular compounds and cactus hedges — The tailed women of the hills — Peculiarities of the natives — Chilly nights — Striking scenery — The summit of the plateau — The descent of Polchi — The discovery of tinstone on the plateau — The settlement of Naraguta — , Doubtful reception by the natives of Ngell.

chapter iv Bauchi to Ibi . . . . . . 89

Scenery around Bauchi — The origin of monkeys — Pagans and Fulani— On the way to Kereng — The grassy plains of Panyam — The sarikin Kereng makes obeisance — Climbing the Kereng cone — Truculent natives — The Angass people — The Wase Rock — The Gurkawa pagans — Character of the country — Ibi and the Benue — Ferrying horses across the river — Leaving for Arofu — An unfortunate occurrence — Kokanda and Nupe canoes — Camping on a sandbank — The lead mines of Arofu — Precautions against alarm —Salt-making at Awe — A characteristic letter — The Ankwe River — A waterless march.

Chapter V

The hills of Kanna — Reception at Bashar — A game reserve— A local superstition — The power of a ju-ju — Ancient lead-mines — The rocks of Ligri — The pagan mind — First view of Tangale Peak — A night march — Native iron - furnaces — Smelting the ore — Bush Fulani — The river Gongola and its faddama— A picturesque village — Arrival at Gombe.

Contents

chapter vi Nafada to Tangale . . . . .146

A garrison town — Stung by a scorpion — The ruins of Burmi — Trouble with the carriers — Willing helpers — The Peak in the distance — A stronghold of paganism — An importunate chief — Approaching the rocks of Ture — The galadima's smile — A solitary grave — The base of the Peak — Giant baboons — The effects of guinea-worm — The galadima acts as guide — The hills of Chongwom — Deadly enemies — Reception at Tangalto — Picturesque country — The prestige of the white man.

Chapter VII

The Bima Hills — A dreary prospect — An obliging sariki — Hostile pagans — The rocks of Chibuk — An alarm of fire — The recent history of Bornu— On the way to Chad — Characteristic scenery — Luxurious travelling — The Residency at Mongonu — Salt-making in the marshes — The silent city of Kukawa — The shores of Chad — A disappointment— Canoeing on the Lake — Mosquitoes and horseflies — Last view of Chad — The saltbush or siwak-tree — A magnificent sunset — Kukawa by moonlight — On the way to Gujba — An impossible request — Approaching Kerri Kerri.

chapter viii On the Borders of Hausaland . . . 210

The Kerri Kerris — In the Golden Age — Canon valleys — The margin of the plateau — The sarikin Daia — The kings of Jellum — Into Hausa country — A disappointed sariki — Hospitable natives — A Hausa welcome — Hausas and Fulani — The rocks of Shira — A midnight thief — Searching the village — The Ningi Hills — A pagan stronghold — Ari, Ningi, and Bura — The magnificence of the sarikin Bura — A striking contrast.

Chapter IX Pack

Entering Hausaland — The old king of Jemaari — An ancient desert surface — Katagum and Hadeija — On the way to Kano — Comfortable travelling — History of Kano and of the Fulani conquest — The British occupation — The capture of Kano — Kano in 1909 — A rumour of insurrection— Departure for Kazaure — On the way to Katsina — Cordial welcomes — An unpleasant experience — Pagan Hausas — Through Fulani country — Recent history of Sokoto — The old city of Wurnu — The valley of the Sokoto River.

CHAPTER X The Gulbin Kebbi and the Middle Niger . 279

The history of Argungu — Hearty welcome by the sariki — Birnin Kebbi — A narrow path — Southward to Yelwa — A decaying city — Approach of the rainy season — The Niger at Bussa — The scene of Park's disaster — The river gorge at Jebba — The Juju Rock — The history of Kontagora — Its capture by the British — The Kaduna at Zungeru — The "jirigin kassa" — Farewell to Mount Patti.

The Future of Nigeria . . . . 298

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

A Granite Dome

On the Forcados River

Convicts at Onitsha.

On the Niger near Igbo

LoKOjA AND Mount Patti

A Byway in Nassarawa

The Plains of Keffi

A Traders' Camping-place

Market-day at Jaginde

The Hills behind Jaginde

A Wayside Halt

The Rest-camp at Polchi

The Court-house at Bauchi

The Rocks of Panyam

The Wase Rock

Frontispiece

FACING PAGE 24

List of Illustrations The Rest-camp at Wase On the Benue Camp near Akiri

On the Kudu River . . .

The Thinly Wooded Plains of Bauchi A Wayside Pool A Mountain Stream .

Crossing the Gongola The Rocks of Chibuk The Residency at Mongonu Camp at Bre .

On Lake Chad The Market-place at Shira A Turtle-back of Granite .

A Village Market .

On the Way to Kano Tying Up the Loads

FACING PAGE 1 08

Chapter I

" Ay, here am I in Arden ; the more fool I ; when I was at bonie^ 1 was in a better place : but travellers must be content ! "

Arrival at Forcados — The Empire and her skipper — Cooks and steward boys — The creeks of the delta — Trading stations on the river — Rectangular wattled huts — The head of the delta — Native convicts at Onitsha — Aground on a sandbank — The harmattan haze — '* Allahu akbar " — The frontier of Northern Nigeria — Picturesque scenery — Bush fires on the river bank — A stranded steamer — In sight of Lokoja.

^k) one who is not quite callous to his fortune returns to Nigeria without feeling in full the force of Touchstone's argument. Those happy, sunny days at home press upon one's heart ; in vain one thinks of busy cities and sweet companionship, of green fields and leafy lanes — those dank mangrove swamps are all too real ! And beyond is a land of darkness, of sickness, of discomfort, of trial : the land where life at best is but existence, where one lives in the past and in the future, least of all in the present 1 " But travellers must be content,"

and your West African is proverbially stoical. Not a sound, not a sigh of regret escapes him ; with a laugh or a jeer he steps ashore ; a man must live and a man must die — it matters little where 1

It was early in the morning of Tuesday, the 24th of November, 1908, that the good ship Burutu anchored off the bar at the mouth of the Forcados River, the most westerly navigable branch of the Niger delta. It had been high water at 3 a.m. ; but the night was dark, there was no moon, and the lesser candles of the night were insufficient to allow our worthy captain to pick up the buoys which mark the channel ; so perforce we had to lie there until the afternoon. All the morning we gazed at the dark and dreary line of mangroves which fringed the eastern sky, and at the tiny blank on the horizon which marked the river mouth and seemed to beckon us on with the hope of passage. And, as if impatient to claim us, the brown water of the Niger came racing over the bar at ebb and joyfully encircled us, only to be met and broken up and streaked with blue by the flowing tide.

By three o'clock we were under way and

steaming towards the line of surf which marked

the sandy bar. Over it we bumped at four, and

by five we were anchored in the port of Forcados,

near the floating dock and five or six other English

and German steamers, smaller than ourselves.

Meanwhile the mails and baggage had been slung

on the after deck and the fore hatches opened,

ready to begin the work of transhipping the Lagos

cargo. Branch boats immediately grappled with us alongside ; native cooks and steward boys came off in canoes to look for masters old and new ; the Customs clerks came on board to gather in their lo per cent, on dutiable goods; and the rattling of chains, the spluttering of donkey engines, and the shouting and talking of the Kroo boys intimated / to the melancholy swamps that yet another steamer had come laden out of the great Unknown.

Forcados should always be visited by night, for by day it is a dismal place. A few houses built on a spit of mud and mangrove-roots accommodate the Resident, the doctor, the Customs officer, and the Company's agent. The native population consists of a dozen or so amphibious creatures, who inhabit a few waterlogged huts half-hidden amongst the mangroves and eke out a precarious existence upon the produce of their fishing nets. Moreover, " the rain it raineth every day," the sky is ever dull and cloudy, the very daylight is sick, and the air hot and steamy and heavy with the rotting odours of the swamp. But at night the scene is transformed ; the twinkling lights of the steamers give a homelike aspect to the port, and the eye cannot reach in the darkness the murky mangroves which line the shores. Almost can one imagine piers and wharves and shuttered warehouses behind the lights, with a sleeping city beyond ; only the damp and stagnant air and the clammy odour of the night remind one that things are not what they seem.

The Northern Nigerian Government steamer came leisurely down from Burutu in the morning, and with much blowing of the siren made fast alongside. It proved to be the Empire, a stronglybuilt double-decked stern-wheeler, one of the oldest and most serviceable steamers on the river. The lower deck and the shallow holds accommodate the engines, cargo, and native passengers ; the upper deck is reserved, as the Notice says, for the convenience, comfort, and recreation of Europeans. The skipper, Williams, a half-caste American negro, is a character in his way. Exiled from the States some fifteen years ago, when his shanghaiing den was cleared, he has made his home on the Niger, and, with a wife in every port, is spending the evening of his days in honourable employment. He considers himself as much superior to his native crew as white is to black, and to hear him rating his sailors as incapable black lubbers is a constant source of amusement. With the instinct of the black man, however, he has proved himself an excellent river navigator, and without the help of a pilot he steers the Empire safe and sound, year in, year out, through all the changing seasons.

By nine o'clock our goods and chattels had been safely stowed aboard the Empire, and after breakfast we bade goodbye to the Burata, with its cleanly cabins, its tidy saloon, its iced drinks, and its airy decks. Another stage of our journey had begun ; another step away from the homeland — and yet another step nearer the return I In two hours we had reached Burutu, a station somewhat more inviting than Forcados. Here are the headquarters of the

x8

Niger Company in Southern Nigeria, with their engineering shops, shipping stores, and canteen ; also the post-office, bank, rest-house, Northern Nigerian marine station, and a native market. There is practically no native town. The houses are built on a sandbank which has been cleared of mangroves, and a few ornamental shrubs and trees help to hide the fact. We lay at the wharf for two hours to lay in provisions and stores for the journey up-river, for on these steamers every one must cater for himself. By three o'clock, however, we were off, the old Empire bravely pounding away and making, with the help of the tide, five or six knots an hour up-stream. By dusk we had more or less settled down in our allotted spaces, and soon after dinner the mosquitoes and the fireflies buzzed over a sleeping ship.

There were nine of us on the Empire, and we were each lucky enough to secure half a cabin, and this was comparative comfort. On the Empire there are four cabins and a messroom fitted with electric light. The skipper's cabin is in front in one corner of the upper deck, and by day he sits in his chair forward and directs the man at the wheel with a wave of his hand to port or starboard. There is one small ladder leading to the lower deck, and below boys, cooks, native passengers, crew, and cargo are mingled in wild confusion. There is a tiny galley, in which the cooks are half-hidden in smoke, and the wonder is, not so much that the food is passably clean, in spite of the crowd and the smoke and the dirt below, but that the cooks are able to cook at all in such a primitive kitchen.

Cooks and steward boys are among the necessities of existence in West Africa. They are sometimes grouped with mosquitoes and sandflies as necessary evils, but the classification is barely justified. Boys will be boys all the world over, and West African boys are largely what their earliest masters make them. A native lad of eight or twelve is, as a rule, much brighter in intellect than the average English boy of the same class and age ; and an unreasonable master will invariably make an unsatisfactory servant even out of the best material. That many boys are thieves and liars is, unfortunately, true ; but, if the whole truth were known, it would probably be found that the fault was not so much on the side of heredity and environment as is commonly supposed. When reasonably treated, the black, man or boy, is as faithful as the white, and if well clothed and cared for by an appreciative master, a boy will patiently endure all the fatigues of constant travel in the bush and be ready and willing to attend to his numerous duties as soon as the camp is pitched.

As a rule a small boy aspires to become in time a cook, a post which carries with it more money and better hopes of matrimony. Native cooks, indeed, are worthy of the greatest admiration. With a minimum of saucepans, a few old tin cans, and a bundle of firewood, a native cook can turn out a five or six course dinner with the greatest ease. The cooking is done, moreover, over an open fire, sometimes set in the lee of a giant kuka-tree, but more often exposed to all the winds of heaven ; and yet the viands are rarely smoked, and ashes conspicuous by their absence. In half an hour's halt by the wayside a breakfast of Quaker oats bacon and eggs, or a luncheon of broiled fowl, can be cooked and dispatched with the greatest ease. Needless to say, however, for such a feat activity and experience are required on the part of both the master and the cook, but the dexterity of the latter is such as even a European chef might envy.

Unfortunately^, occasions do arise upon which even the best of cooks may fail, when the soup is watery, the fowl tough and leathery, the pawpaw dirty, and the pudding like rubber ; and at these times the language of the master is better imagined than described I

It is customary to engage a cook and one or two boys at Burutu for the river journey only, and if on arrival at Lokoja the master is dissatisfied with his servants, he may there discharge them and renew his stafT locally. As a rule down-river boys are of little use in Northern Nigeria. The principal point in their favour is that they have fewer friends up-country and that they are therefore less inclined to frequent the towns and villages after dark. Against this, however, must be placed the fact that they have been bred in a country where water is more plentiful and the paths much softer, and that consequently their feet soon give out on the rough stony roads of the north. Moreover, they have not a fluent acquaintance with Hausa and other tribal languages, and consequently make bad bargains in the local markets.

The Empire had anchored for the night about thirty miles up the Forcados River, and beyond the mangrove -roots and the brackish waters of the tidal stream. Next morning the banks became higher and densely fringed with palms and evergreen trees. Tributary creeks opened on either hand, broad and clear and placid, or narrow dark and full of mystery. The primitive peoples of the delta were little in evidence. Now and then from the dark shadows of a smaller creek a black canoe, with a dusky maiden in the stern, clad only in wristlets and anklets of ivory, would dart out into the sunshine, only to beat a hasty retreat into the depths of the forest ; or a dug-out, moored to ai stake on the river-bank, would be the only indication of a native village hidden behind the leafy veil. The old Empire, however, with its motley crew, was probably the cynosure of many eyes ; but the inaccessibility of the primeval forests of the delta has delayed the development of their primitive inhabitants, and they are still shy of the white man and all his works. With their shyness, however, is coupled a certain inherent truculence, which is exhibited whenever the white man wanders out of the beaten track. To the native the river is now irretrievably in possession of the foreigner, but he still hotly resents any intrusion into his leafy domains on either bank.

In a few hours we reached Ganna Ganna, one of the first trading stations to be established on the river. Its very aspect and situation are redolent of times gone by. The bungalows and store-houses are built on an island in mid-stream, and the shores are strewn with the keels and prows of departed barges and river boats. The station from the first occupied a coign of vantage, being naturally fortified by its insular position ; but it is easy to cast the mind back to the days when, on dark and cheerless nights, the island was beset by mobs of naked savages thirsting for the blood of the white men and the riches of their stores. But now on the river climatic foes alone are to be feared, and of their virulence we were strongly reminded as, at the sound of the Empire's siren, an emaciated European dragged himself up to the verandah and in a weary voice ordered his native attendants to launch a canoe and bring off the mails from his far-ofi^ home.

The delta trader's lot is not a happy one. He must remain cooped up in his dismal store, bargaining and bartering with his dusky neighbours, from early morn till dewy eve. His chances of exercise are very meagre, for he dare not venture far inward from his post. His only excitement is the coming and going of the steamers. Little wonder, then, that even a sick man rises from his bed to rest his eyes upon those links with home and to bless the hearts and hands of the distant friends who have thought of him in his loneliness.

Above Ganna Ganna the white roofs of the trading stores become more frequent on either bank. Perched almost on the water's edge, they represent a distinct advance upon the hulks and barges of the early days, which were moored at night in mid-stream and drawn up to the bank by day to trade and barter with the treacherous natives. As each store comes in sight the skipper rises to the occasion ; and, full of authority as the master of an R.M.S., viciously blows the siren and vigorously rattles the engine-room telegraph, to the open-mouthed amazement and delight of the boys and native passengers. With voice and gesture also he urges on the canoe which pushes out from shore as if even on the confines of the Empire His Majesty's mails must not for a single second be delayed.

As we ascend the river the natives gradually become less shy and more demonstrative. Their villages of wattled huts, rectangular in shape and plastered with mud, are set in clearings on the river bank, while the boys and girls, the youths and maidens rush wildly to the canoes, paddle out towards the steamer, and dive and swim excitedly after the empty tins and bottles which the boys delight in throwing from the upper deck. And despite their professed indifference and their conscious superiority as servants of the white men, our boys themselves look as if they would dearly love to join in the scramble with their less sophisticated brethren .

As we approached the head of the delta the character of the vegetation and the aspect of the

«4 river gradually changed. Coarse rank grass began to appear on the river bank and to form, with creeping and twining plants, a thick undergrowth to the forest of palms and evergreen trees. Here and there above the general level of the forest there rose the lofty crown of a deciduous tree, while in places on the water's edge the bank had slipped and the graceful crests of the palms alone protruded from the stream. An occasional sandbank, moreover, added a touch of colour to the gloomy waters of the river, and spoke eloquently of the winding channels and the golden sands of the open north.

Presently we passed Abo, a large native town and trading station situated at the head of the delta. And now at length we changed our course to stem the waters of the lordly Niger. Behind us we left the dreary swamps and the dismal creeks of the ill-omened delta, and joyfully we turned our faces northward to greet the land of sunshine and of promise. We thought of the bygone heroes who for weeks and months at a stretch had braved the reeking odours of the swamps and the poisoned darts of the riverain natives, to find in the delta's maze this passage to the golden north. In two short days we had traversed the work of years, and in peace and comparative comfort and luxury reached the gateway of the promised land.

Soon the aspect of the river began again to change. The shallowing waters laid bare extensive sandbanks, peopled by egrets, cranes, and vultures. Here and there a fisherman had fixed his nets in the falling stream, or lazily towed them behind his canoe in the quiet waters. Now and then a crocodile could be seen basking and gaping in the sunshine, while a hippo splashed in a neighbouring pool. By the time Onitsha came in sight the margins of the river were less densely wooded, while many of the sandbanks in mid-channel were grassed over and studded with scrubby trees and bushes. Over the broad sandy river-bed the channel wound about from right to left and left to right, with the deeper water and the more precipitous banks now at one side, now at the other, with broad and shallow reaches between. The steamer likewise wound about, following the deepest water, with the quartermaster steadily heaving the lead over the sandy shallows.

It is a common occurrence when the river is low for these flat-bottomed steamers to ground on the river-bed, and the shallows below Onitsha are notably difficult to cross. Sandbanks also in course of formation are not always visible even to the practised eye of the pilot. When the steamer runs on a bank it is customary in the first place for the master to order the crew overboard. Fifteen or twenty stalwart sailors at once hop over the low gunwales, which are only a few inches above the water-level, and, with much shouting and struggling, attempt to push the steamer backwards off the bank. The attempt usually fails, however, from want of united effort, the crew being individually sufficiently dexterous to avoid any

muscular over-strain. The master then decides upon more determined efforts, and orders the crew to shoulder the kedge anchor and carry it some distance astern into deeper water. The anchor line is then attached to the drum of the donkey engine and the steamer hauled backwards into the channel. This operation is usually successful ; but in very refractory cases the crew are set to dig away the sand from beneath and behind the steamer until she slips backwards into the stream.

Onitsha is one of the most important towns on the Lower Niger, as well as a local administrative centre in Southern Nigeria. The European quarters are built on a ridge of high ground which runs inland behind the native town, while the traders' stores and bungalows are set lower down by the riverside. At this season the banks are steep and high, and in the absence of cranes and other conveniences the process of unloading heavy cargo is rather a tedious one. As a rule the native porters are fairly dexterous ; but, as it happ)ened, the Empire had on board a considerable quantity of Government stores in the shape of casks of rice and cases of provisions, and a gang of convicts had been sent down from the prison to unload them. The convicts, some of whom had their feet loosely chained together, were clad in short white tunics and loin-cloths stamped with the broad arrow, and looked a strong and lusty crowd. Under the charge of their native warders, however, they proved to be quite Gilbertian workers. Six men would struggle valiantly with a packing-case

which, after some little persuasion by a warder, one man would take on his head and carry off quite cheerfully. Twelve men would bravely endeavour to get a cask into position, until the two warders, in despair, would order them to stand aside while they put the matter right themselves. Occasionally a warder, by way of correction, would tap a convict lightly on the shoulder with his cane, and thereupon the convict and all his fellows would at once stop work, and a prolonged and heated altercation would ensue between the warder and his charges. To crown all, at four o'clock, after a little cheerful conversation with the convicts, the warders decided to stop work lest they should tire the prisoners, and it was only with the greatest difficulty that the skipper persuaded them to renew their united efforts until five I

We lay at Onitsha all night, and next morning the same hopeful band returned to complete their labours ; but in spite of, or perhaps on account of, their ardour, it was again five o'clock before the Empire at last got under way. Night fell clear and starry, and soon the moon rose in all its tropical brilliance. For a time the skipper pushed ahead, but soon after dinner the Empire plunged hopelessly into a sandbank, and all efforts to move her were, by one consent, postponed till dawn. A gentle breeze on the river kept the decks free from mosquitoes and other insect pests. We lay outstretched on our camp chairs, enjoying the calm radiance of the tropical even. The black waters lapped gently round us, the sandbanks gleamed